Famous American Statesmen

In London, the present Duke of Wellington gave him a grand banquet at Apsley House. At Marlborough House, the Prince of Wales gave him private audience. The freedom of the city of London was presented to him in a gold casket, supported by golden American eagles, standing on a velvet plinth decorated with stars and stripes. He and his family dined with the Queen, at Windsor Castle.

In Scotland, the freedom of the city of Edinburgh was conferred upon him. At a grand ovation at Newcastle, between forty and fifty thousand people were gathered on the moor to see the illustrious general. To the International Arbitration Union in Birmingham he said, "Nothing would afford me greater happiness than to know, as I believe will be the case, that at some future day the nations of the earth will agree upon some sort of congress which shall take cognizance of international questions of difficulty, and whose decisions will be as binding as the decision of our Supreme Court is binding upon us." In Belgium, the king called upon him, and gave a royal banquet in his honor. In Berlin, Bismarck called twice to see him, shaking hands cordially, and saying, "Glad to welcome General Grant to Germany." In Turkey, he was presented with some beautiful Arabian horses by the Sultan. King Humbert of Italy and the Czar of Russia showed him marked attentions. In Norway and Sweden, Spain, China, Egypt, and India, he was everywhere received as the most distinguished general of the age.

On his return to America, at San Francisco and Sacramento, thousands gathered to see him. At Chicago, he said, in addressing the Army of the Tennessee, "Let us be true to ourselves, avoid all bitterness and ill-feeling, either on the part of sections or parties toward each other, and we need have no fear in future of maintaining the stand we have taken among nations, so far as opposition from foreign nations goes." In Philadelphia, where he was royally entertained by his friend Mr. George W. Childs, he said to the Grand Army of the Republic, "What I want to impress upon you is that you have a country to be proud of, and a country to fight for, and a country to die for if need be… In no other country is the young and energetic man given such a chance by industry and frugality to acquire a competence for himself and family as in America. Abroad it is difficult for the poor man to make his way at all. All that is necessary is to know this in order that we may become better citizens." On his return to New York, he was presented by his friends with a home in that city, and also with the gift of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.

He was soon prevailed upon to enter a banking firm with Ferdinand Ward and James D. Fish. The bank failed, Grant found himself financially ruined, and the two partners were sent to prison. He was now to struggle again for a living, as in the early days in the Galena leather store. A timely offer came from the Century magazine, to write his experiences in the Civil War. Very simply, so that an uneducated person could understand, Grant modestly and fairly described the great battles in which he was of necessity the central figure. Unused to literary labor, he bent himself to the task, working seven and eight hours a day.

On October 22, 1884, cancer developed in the throat, and for nine months Grant fought with death, till the two great volumes of his memoirs could be completed and given to the world, that his family might not be left dependent. Early in June, 1885, as he was failing rapidly, he was taken to Mt. McGregor, near Saratoga, where a cottage had been offered him by Mr. Joseph W. Drexel. He worked now more heroically than ever, till the last page was written, with the words: "The war has made us a nation of great power and intelligence. We have but little to do to preserve peace, happiness, and prosperity at home, and the respect of other nations. Our experience ought to teach us the necessity of the first; our power secures the latter.

"I feel that we are on the eve of a new era, when there is to be great harmony between the Federal and Confederate. I cannot stay to be a living witness to the correctness of this prophecy; but I feel it within me that it is to be so. The universally kind feeling expressed for me at a time when it was supposed that each day would prove my last seemed to me the beginning of the answer to 'Let us have peace.'"

Night and day the nation watched for tidings from the bedside of the dying hero. At last, in July, when he knew that the end was near, he wrote an affectionate letter to the Julia Dent whom he had loved in his early manhood, and put it in his pocket, that she might read it after all was over. "Look after our dear children, and direct them in the paths of rectitude. It would distress me far more to think that one of them could depart from an honorable, upright, and virtuous life, than it would to know that they were prostrated on a bed of sickness from which they were never to arise alive. They have never given us any cause for alarm on their account, and I earnestly pray they never will.

"With these few injunctions and the knowledge I have of your love and affection, and of the dutiful affection of all our children, I bid you a final farewell, until we meet in another, and, I trust, a better world. You will find this on my person after my demise." Blessed home affection, that brightens all the journey, and makes human nature well-nigh divine!

On July 23, 1885, a few minutes before eight o'clock in the morning, the end came. In the midst of his children, Colonel Frederick, Ulysses, Jesse, and Nellie Grant-Sartoris, and his grandchildren, his wife bending over him, he sank to rest. In every city and town in the land there was genuine sorrow. Letters of sympathy came from all parts of the world. Before the body was put in its purple casket, the eldest son placed a plain gold ring upon the little finger of the right hand, the gift years before of his wife, but which had grown too large for the emaciated finger in life. In his pocket was placed a tiny package containing a lock of Mrs. Grant's hair, in a good-bye letter. Sweet and beautiful thought, to bury with our dead something which belongs to a loved one, that they may not sleep entirely alone!

"We shall wake, and remember, and understand." Let the world laugh at sentiment outwardly – the hearts of those who laugh are often hungering for affection!

The body, dressed in citizen's clothes, without military, was laid in the casket. Then, in the little cottage on the mountain-top, Dr. Newman, his pastor, gave a beautiful address, from the words, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant; enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." "His was the genius of common-sense, enabling him to contemplate all things in their true relations, judging what is true, useful, proper, expedient, and to adopt the best means to accomplish the largest ends. From this came his seriousness, thoughtfulness, penetration, discernment, firmness, enthusiasm, triumph… Temperate without austerity; cautious without fear; brave without rashness; serious without melancholy, he was cheerful without frivolity. His constancy was not obstinacy; his adaptation was not fickleness. His hopefulness was not utopian. His love of justice was equalled only by his delight in compassion, and neither was sacrificed to the other… The keenest, closest, broadest of all observers, he was the most silent of men. He lived within himself. His thought-life was most intense. His memory and his imagination were picture galleries of the world and libraries of treasured thought. He was a world to himself. His most intimate friends knew him only in part. He was fully and best known only to the wife of his bosom and the children of his loins. To them the man of iron will and nerve of steel was gentle, tender, and confiding, and to them he unfolded his beautiful religious life."

After the services, the body of the great soldier was placed upon the funeral car, and conveyed to Albany, where it lay in state at the Capitol. At midnight dirges were sung, while eager multitudes passed by looking upon the face of the dead. Arriving in New York, the casket was laid in the midst of exquisite flowers in the City Hall. On this very day memorial services were held in Westminster Abbey, Canon Farrar delivering an eloquent address.

During the first night at the City Hall, about fifteen thousand persons passed the coffin, and the next day ninety thousand; rich and poor, black and white; men, women, and little children. A man on crutches hobbled past the casket, bowed with grief. "Move on," said one of the guards of honor. "Yes," replied the old man, "as well as I can I will. I left this leg in the Wilderness." An aged woman wept as she said, "Oh! general, I gave you my husband, my sons, and my son's beautiful boys."

On August 8, General Grant was laid in his tomb at Riverside Park, on the Hudson River, a million people joining in the sad funeral ceremonies. The catafalque, with its black horses led by colored grooms, moved up the street, followed by a procession four miles long. When the tomb was reached, the casket, placed in a cedar covering, leaden lined, was again enclosed in a great steel casket, round like an immense boiler, weighing thirty-eight hundred pounds. The only touching memento left upon the coffin was a wreath of oak-leaves wrought together by his grandchild Julia, on his dying day, with the words, "To Grandpa." Guns were fired, and cannon reverberated through the valley, as the pall-bearers, Confederate and Union generals, turned their footsteps away from the resting-place of their great leader. It was fitting that North and South should unite in his burial. Here, too, will sometime be laid his wife, for before his death he exacted a promise from his oldest son: "Wherever I am buried, promise me that your mother shall be buried by my side." Already she has received over three hundred thousand dollars in royalty on the memoirs which he wrote in those last months of agony. Beautifully wrote Richard Watson Gilder: —

 "All's over now; here let our captain rest, —The conflict ended, past men's praise and blame;Here let him rest, alone with his great fame, —Here in the city's heart he loved the best,And where our sons his tomb may seeTo make them brave as he: — "As brave as he, – he on whose iron armOur Greatest leaned, our gentlest and most wise, —Leaned when all other help seemed mocking lies,While this one soldier checked the tide of harm,And they together saved the State,And made it free and great."

JAMES A. GARFIELD

Not far from where I write is a tall gray stone monument, in the form of a circular tower, lined with various polished marbles, and exquisite stained-glass windows. It stands on a hill-top in the centre of three acres of green lawn, looking out upon blue Lake Erie and the busy city of Cleveland, Ohio.

Within this tower rests the body of one whom the nation honors, and will honor in all time to come; one who was nurtured in the wilderness that he might have a sweet, natural boyhood; who studied in the school of poverty that he might sympathize with the sons of toil; who grew to an ideal manhood, that other American boys might learn the lessons of a grand life, and profit by them.

In the little town of Orange, Ohio, James Abram Garfield was born, November 19, 1831. The home into which he came was a log cabin, twenty by thirty feet, made of unhewn logs, laid one upon another, to the height of twelve feet or more, the space between the logs being filled with clay or mud. Three other children were in this home in the forest already; Mehetabel, Thomas, and Mary.

Abram, the father, descended from Revolutionary ancestors, was a strong-bodied, strong-brained man, who moved from Worcester, Otsego County, New York, to test his fortune in the wilderness. In his boyhood, he had played with Eliza Ballou, descended from Maturin Ballou, a Huguenot, from France. She also at fourteen moved with her family from New Hampshire, into the Ohio wilderness. Abram was more attracted to Ohio for that reason. They renewed the affection of their childhood, and were married February 3, 1821, settling first in Newburg, near Cleveland, and later buying eighty acres in Orange, at two dollars an acre. Here their four children were born, seven miles from any other cabin.

When the boy James was eighteen months old, a shadow settled over the home in the woods. A fire broke out in the forest, threatening to sweep away the Garfield cabin. For two hours one hot July day the father fought the flames, took a severe cold, and died suddenly, saying to his wife, "I have planted four saplings in these woods; I must now leave them to your care." He had kept his precious ones from being homeless, only to leave them fatherless. Who would have thought then that one of these saplings would grow into a mighty tree, admired by all the world?

In a corner of the wheat-field, in a plain box, the young husband was buried. What should the mother do with her helpless flock? "Give them away," said some of the relatives, or "bind them out in far-away homes."

"No," said the brave mother, and put her woman's hands to heavy work. She helped her boy Thomas, then nine years old, to split rails and fence in the wheat-field. She corded the wool of her sheep, wove the cloth, and made garments for her children. She sold enough land to pay off the mortgage, because she could not bear to be in debt, and then she and Mehetabel and Thomas ploughed and planted, and waited in faith and hope till the harvest came. When the food grew meagre she sang to her helpful children, and looked ever toward brighter days. And such days usually come to those who look for them.

It was not enough to widow Garfield that her children were decently clothed and fed in this isolated home. They must be educated; but how? A log school-house was finally erected, she wisely giving a corner of her farm for the site. The scholars sat on split logs for benches, and learned to read and write and spell as best they could from their ordinary teaching. James was now nearly three, and went and sat all day on the hard benches with the rest.

But a school-house was not sufficient for these New England pioneers; they must have a church building where they could worship. Mrs. Garfield loved her Bible, and had taught her children daily, so that James even knew its stories by heart, and many of its chapters. A church was therefore organized in the log school-house, and now they could work happily, year after year, wondering perchance what the future would bring.

James began to show great fondness for reading. As he lay on the cabin floor, by the big fireplace, he read by its light his "English Reader," "Robinson Crusoe" again and again, and, later, when he was twelve, "Josephus," and "Goodrich's History of the United States." He had worked on the farm for years; now he must earn some money for his mother by work for the neighbors. He had helped his brother Thomas in enlarging the house, and was sure that he could be a carpenter.

Going to a Mr. Trent, he asked for work.

"There is a pile of boards that I want planed," said the man, "and I will pay you one cent a board for planing."

James began at once, and at the end of a long day, to the amazement of Mr. Trent, he had planed one hundred boards, each over twelve feet long, and proudly carried home one dollar to his mother. After this he helped to build a barn and a shed for a potashery establishment for leeching ashes. The manufacturer of the "black-salts" seemed to take a fancy to the lad, and offered him work at nine dollars a month and his board, which James accepted. In the evenings he studied arithmetic and read books about the sea. This arrangement might have continued for some time had not the daughter of the salt-maker remarked one evening to her beau, as they sat in the room where James was reading, "I should think it was time for hired servants to be abed."

James had not realized how the presence of a third party is apt to restrain the confidential conversation of lovers. He was hurt and angered by the words, and the next day gave up his work, and went home to his mother, to receive her sympathy and find employment elsewhere. Doubtless he was more careful, all his life, from this circumstance, lest he wound the feelings of others.

Soon after this he heard that his uncle in Newburg was hiring wood-choppers. He immediately went to see him, and agreed to cut one hundred cords of wood, at twenty-five cents a cord. It was a man's work, but the boy of sixteen determined to do as much as a man. Each day he cut two cords, and at last carried twenty-five dollars to his mother; a small fortune, it seemed to the earnest boy.

While he chopped wood he looked out wistfully upon Lake Erie, recalled the sea stories which he had read, and longed more than ever to become a sailor. The Orange woods were growing too cramped for him. He was restless and eager for a broader life. It was the unrest of ambition, which voiced itself twenty years later in an address at Washington, D. C., to young men. "Occasion cannot make spurs, young men. If you expect to wear spurs, you must win them. If you wish to use them, you must buckle them to your own heels before you go into the fight. Any success you may achieve is not worth the having unless you fight for it. Whatever you win in life you must conquer by your own efforts; and then it is yours – a part of yourself… Let not poverty stand as an obstacle in your way. Poverty is uncomfortable, as I can testify; but nine times out of ten the best thing that can happen to a young man is to be tossed overboard, and compelled to sink or swim for himself. In all my acquaintance I have never known one to be drowned who was worth saving… To a young man who has in himself the magnificent possibilities of life, it is not fitting that he should be permanently commanded; he should be a commander. You must not continue to be employed; you must be an employer. You must be promoted from the ranks to a command. There is something, young men, that you can command; go and find it, and command it. You can at least command a horse and dray, can be generalissimo of them and may carve out a fortune with them."

Mrs. Garfield, with her mother's heart, deprecated a life at sea for her boy, and tried to dissuade him. Through the summer he worked in the hay-field, and then, the sea-fever returning, his mother wisely suggested that he seek employment on Lake Erie and see if he liked the life.

With his clothing wrapped in a bundle, he walked seventeen miles to Cleveland, with glowing visions of being a sailor. Reaching the wharf, he went on board a schooner, and asked for work. A drunken captain met him with oaths, and ordered him off the boat. The first phase of sea life had been different from what he had read in the books, and he turned away somewhat disheartened.

However, he soon met a cousin, who gave him the opportunity of driving mules for a canal boat. To walk beside slow mules was somewhat prosaic, as compared with climbing masts in a storm, but he accepted the position, receiving ten dollars a month and his board. Says William M. Thayer, in his "From Log-Cabin to the White House": "James appeared to possess a singular affinity for the water. He fell into the water fourteen times during the two or three months he served on the canal boat. It was not because he was so clumsy that he could not keep right side up, nor because he did not understand the business; rather, we think, it arose from his thorough devotion to his work. He gave more attention to the labor in hand than he did to his own safety. He was one who never thought of himself when he was serving another. He thought only of what he had in hand to do. His application was intense, and his perseverance royal."

After a few weeks he contracted fever and ague, and went home to be cared for by his mother, through nearly five months of illness. The sea-fever had somewhat abated. Could he not go to school again? urged the mother. Thomas and she could give him seventeen dollars; not much, to be sure, for some people, but much for the widow and her son.

At last he decided to go to Geauga Seminary, at Chester; a decision which took him to the presidential chair. March 5, 1849, when he was eighteen, James and his cousins started on foot for Chester, carrying their housekeeping utensils, plates, knives and forks, kettle, and the like; for they must board themselves. A small room was hired for a pittance, four boys rooming together.

The seventeen dollars soon melted away, and James found work in a carpenter's shop, where he labored nights and mornings, and every Saturday. Though especially fond of athletic games, he had no time for these. The school library contained one hundred and fifty volumes; a perfect mine of knowledge it seemed to the youth from Orange. He read eagerly biography and history; joined the debating society, where, despite his awkward manners and poor clothes, his eloquence soon attracted attention; went home to see his mother at the end of the first term, happy and courageous, and returned with ninepence in his pocket, to renew the struggle for an education. The first Sunday, at church, he put this ninepence into the contribution box, probably feeling no poorer than before.

While at Chester, the early teaching of his mother bore fruit, in his becoming a Christian, and joining the sect called "Disciples." "Of course," said Garfield, years later, "that settled canal, and lake, and sea, and everything." A new life had begun – a life devoted to the highest endeavor.

Each winter, while at Chester, he taught a district school, winning the love of the pupils by his enthusiasm and warm heart, and inciting them to study from his love of books. He played with them as though a boy like themselves, as he was, in reality, and yet demanded and received perfect obedience. He "boarded around," as was the custom, and thus learned more concerning both parents and pupils than was always desirable, probably; but in every house he tried to stimulate all to increased intelligence.

During his last term at the seminary, he met a graduate of a New England college, who urged that he also attend college; told how often men had worked their way through successfully, and had come to prominence. Young Garfield at once began to study Latin and Greek, and at twenty years of age presented himself at Hiram College, Ohio, a small institution at that time, which had been started by the "Disciples." He sought the principal, and asked to ring the bell and sweep the floors to help pay his expenses. He took a room with four other students, not a wise plan, except for one who has will enough to study whether his companions work or play, and rose at five in the morning, to ring his bell.

A lady who attended the college thus writes of him: "I can see him even now, standing in the morning with his hand on the bell-rope, ready to give the signal calling teachers and scholars to engage in the duties of the day. As we passed by, entering the school-room, he had a cheerful word for every one. He was probably the most popular person in the institution. He was always good-natured, fond of conversation, and very entertaining. He was witty and quick at repartee, but his jokes, though brilliant and sparkling, were always harmless, and he never would willingly hurt another's feelings.

"Afterward, he became an assistant teacher, and while pursuing his classical studies, preparatory to his college course, he taught the English branches. He was a most entertaining teacher, – ready with illustrations, and possessing in a marked degree the power of exciting the interest of the scholars, and afterward making clear to them the lessons. In the arithmetic class there were ninety pupils, and I cannot remember a time when there was any flagging in the interest. There were never any cases of unruly conduct, or a disposition to shirk. With scholars who were slow of comprehension, or to whom recitations were a burden on account of their modest or retiring dispositions, he was specially attentive, and by encouraging words and gentle assistance would manage to put all at their ease, and awaken in them a confidence in themselves… He was a constant attendant at the regular meetings for prayer, and his vigorous exhortations and apt remarks upon the Bible-lessons were impressive and interesting. There was a cordiality in his disposition which won quickly the favor and esteem of others. He had a happy habit of shaking hands, and would give a hearty grip which betokened a kind-hearted feeling for all…